


baby bluebird

by plinth_of_life



Series: among the wildflowers [1]
Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Babies, Established Relationship, Introspection, Light Angst, M/M, Near Future
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-03
Updated: 2020-07-20
Packaged: 2021-02-18 23:47:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 15
Words: 21,282
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22101766
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/plinth_of_life/pseuds/plinth_of_life
Summary: Dan Howell wants a baby. This is the story of the aftermath of that desire.Or, a journey to parenthood in several parts.
Relationships: Dan Howell/Phil Lester
Series: among the wildflowers [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1853197
Comments: 74
Kudos: 121





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> title from "baby bluebird" by the fruit bats

Cold weather never suited Dan Howell. The winter chill was always a reminder of who he pretended to be, an excuse to wrap up his true self in enough layers so no one could see it. He used to find comfort in being bundled up like that. It was as if by building his brand of cold, soulless humour, existential dread, and a dash of self-hatred, it became a shelter, keeping him safe from the harsh and bitter truths of the outside world. But it was a façade nonetheless, one that needed to be destroyed in order for him to live with any sense of authenticity. He shed one layer when he stepped away from his emo style and flattened fringe. He took off another when he came out to the world then another when he married the only man who knew his secret love story. Now, when Dan ventured out of the house and into a blustery January night, he didn’t miss how bundled up he used to be.

He was on his way to Tesco, a rare outing for someone with a notorious disinclination to go outside and a recognizable face to boot. If it wasn’t for the fact that Phil’s birthday was tomorrow and the two had a tradition of ordering ridiculous cakes for the other, he would certainly not have braved the winter weather.

Dan had only intended to pick up the cake that evening. He hoped the final product was worth it after spending 15 minutes on the phone with some poor grocery store employee explaining how to spell out “The Phass and the Phurious” and trying to pretend like it wasn’t a stupid pun about his husband’s ass (which it totally was). When he approached the bakery section of the store to talk to the employee working there, a young, timid woman, most likely the one he spoke to on the phone, he simply gave his "name", a pseudonym, and paid, hoping to avoid any awkward conversations about action movies or spouses’ birthdays. But he could tell the instant she looked up from the cash register that he wouldn’t be able to get out so easily. He saw that flicker in her eyes, the one he couldn’t go a day out in public without seeing. Before he could say anything, she quickly turned her back to him and reached up on her tip toes to grab a large rectangular box on a high shelf. Dan almost convinced himself to leave the counter when the employee turned around and faced him with a wide, overly perky smile.

“You’re Daniel Howell, right?”

Both her grin and her hands around the box remained tightly in place. If given a second more of silence, Dan was certain she’d begin to ask for a selfie.

“Yep, that’s me. Here’s £20, keep the change!”

He threw the note on the counter, pulled the cake from her hands with a firm grip, and briskly walked away, fast enough that he wouldn’t have to see her disappointed expression. But looking around, he began to shiver and suddenly he missed the defenses he used to have intact. He started to notice the pairs of eyes around him, the ones that gave him a glance with a flicker just the same as the employee. He felt surrounded by those eyes, like each one was shooting laser beams and there was no safe place to step. With a quick survey of the space around him, however, he saw that the aisle to the right, ahead of where he was standing, seemed to be deserted. He ducked between the displays of neatly stacked cans on either side of the aisle, placed the cake on the floor next to him and crouched, cursing his ridiculously tall figure.

Maybe no one was looking at him after all. Maybe he was just paranoid about being out in public after avoiding ordinary places like this for so long. Maybe he was still afraid of being vulnerable without layers of protection, to be seen with a wedding ring on his finger and a cake for his husband in his hands. Though the world had known about his and Phil’s relationship for quite some time now, and suspected it for even longer, he still got chills whenever anyone would smile if he and Phil held hands in public or when anyone’s eyes caught sight of the rings on their fingers.

Dan shook his head, trying to dispel his ridiculous paranoia. They told the world they were together and they announced when they got married. The world knew he and Phil loved each other, that they were actual soulmates for that matter. There was nothing left to hide. As Dan came back to reality, still squatting in the middle of the supermarket, he finally lifted his head and looked at what was on the shelf in front of him.

Facing him were rows upon rows of tiny glass jars, each one a different shade of beige. Some were a little orange, others more pink, and most verging on a pukey tinge of green. But each label was the same: a little heart in the center, with a description of the contents inside, printed in a font resembling a legible version of a small child’s handwriting. Each letter was a different vibrant hue and around the heart were the ingredients in the form of little cartoons, seemingly drawn with crayons and just as vibrant.

Dan slowly rose to his feet and picked up a jar from the shelf. His enormous hand made it look even smaller and more delicate. The heart contained the words “Banana Brekkie” and was surrounded by drawings of bright yellow bananas with happy little smiles and rosy cheeks. Perhaps that’s the expression a baby is supposed to have when enjoying their banana brekkie. Or maybe it isn’t so much the flavour of the meal but the way it’s delivered that would make them smile like that. They’d watch the spoon transform into a rocket ship, zooming in circles in front of their face, then when they ate the mouthful, cheers would erupt and another rocket would begin to launch. He would smile at them, so proud that his kid was getting the hang of solid food, even if most of it ended up on the bib, the tray of the high chair, or the baby’s face. None of that mattered though, just the happy giggles he’d hear as every rocket ship took off.

“Excuse me!”

Dan almost dropped the jar in his hand at the sound and looked around to see where the voice was coming from. It took him a second to realize its origin was far below him.

“What dat say?”

A short pudgy finger pointed at the boxed cake, still laying in the middle of the aisle. Dan’s gaze moved from the tip of the little finger to a shock of wavy chesnut hair and two wide eyes peering up at his own.

Dan crouched again to look the little child directly in the eyes and give him a warm smile, trying to hide the mental gymnastics going on in his head as he attempted to explain what was written on that cake. He crossed his fingers that this kid was too young to read properly.

“It says… uh… ‘Happy Birthday, Phil’.”

“Who’s Phil?”

“M- muh- my- my husband… My husband’s name is Phil.”

“But you’re not a lady!”

“Well, sometimes boys fancy other boys andー”

Suddenly, a thin hand gripped the child’s arm and pulled him away from Dan.

“Jeremy! Come on, leave that man alone!”

Dan stood back up as Jeremy was pulled away by the woman Dan presumed to be his mother. The little boy’s eyes grew even wider, seemingly enamored by Dan’s stature. Looking back at him, Dan became enamored by those eyes, getting lost in their chocolate brown tone. The resemblance was so uncanny, it was as if he was looking at his own reflection.

Swiftly, the woman turned Jeremy around and squeezed his hand a little tighter, dragging him down the aisle. Dan realized he should probably avoid staring at other people’s children like that but he couldn’t get past what he saw. Obviously, that wasn’t his child but he couldn’t shake the thought that he could contribute to making a little being with the same brown eyes. He could make a little being that would be all his own, one that would look at him with those eyes when the rocketship started to fly. He could see his reflection through the ages as he raised that little being, one whose eyes could fill with as much innocence and curiosity as those of the child in the store.

No matter how intriguing those eyes were, now was not the time to make decisions about any possible descendents, Dan reminded himself. He had a cake to bring home, a husband to return to, and perhaps a future conversation to be had. So Dan, after much delay, picked the cake up off the floor and marched out of Tesco into that cold January night, trying to avoid the eyes of those around him the best that he could.


	2. Chapter 2

Trying to sneak a large rectangular cake into his own home was a task far more difficult than Dan imagined. Balancing the oblong box on one hand, he fished for his keys and unlocked the door. Upon stepping into the house, he immediately heard the  _ click-clack _ of paws and soon Dewey, his and Phil’s corgi, came running up to the front door to greet his owner.

“Hi buddy! I can’t pet you right now, but I will later, I promise!”

Dewey let out a little whimper and ran back to where he came from. Meanwhile, Dan shifted his focus back to the cake. He placed the box on the counter and opened the fridge, hoping there’d be room for the cake. He became caught up in sorting through condiments, leftovers and produce, making space for the cake and generally cleaning up while he was at it.

“What took you so long?”

He jumped at the sound of his husband’s voice, then leaped up and covered the transparent part of the cake’s packaging with his arms. The idea of a birthday cake was no surprise for Phil but Dan could hardly wait to see the look on his face when yet another ridiculous design would be placed in front of him.

“Just… got a little turned around. Haven’t been to Tesco in quite a while, that’s all.”

“Alright, you could’ve texted me first though, babe. I was planning on splitting an Indian takeaway with you but I had to eat my chicken katsu curry sad and alone instead.”

Dan snorted at Phil’s whimpering expression and rolled his eyes.

“Oh, shut up. You had Dewey to keep you company  _ and _ you got a fancy takeaway while I ventured into the cold outdoors to get  _ your _ cake. How hard that must have been for you!”

Phil let out a disgruntled laugh, halfway between amused and irritated. He started to turn around in the direction of the lounge.

“Whatever, Dan. I’ll leave you be to hide my cake and fix some sorry little meal for yourself. If you get the inclination to apologize,  _ maybe _ I’ll let you watch Drag Race with me.”

“And if I wash up all the dishes from today, may I have some cuddles thrown in?”

“Hmm… you make a good offer, Howell. Let me deliberate this with RuPaul.”

Dan quietly chuckled to himself and resumed his task of organizing the fridge. But as he picked up every jar to move it to its rightful place, he couldn’t get the image of the tiny jars from earlier out of his head. They were so small compared to what he was sorting now. He almost wished he bought one just to feel it in his hand again, like the act of owning a jar of baby food was one step closer to having a baby to go with it.

For what felt like the hundredth time that day, Dan forced himself to escape whatever fantasies were formulating in his head and focus on the moment. He gave up on neatness and shoved the cake into the fridge, cramming it underneath a box of leftover pizza so the design would stay covered. He gave a quick rinse to the pile of dishes in the sink and put them in the dishwasher, hoping he did enough to deserve cuddles with his husband. Dan went back to the pizza box in the fridge, grabbed a slice from it, and took it to the lounge. Maybe spending time with Phil would distract him from whatever was happening in his imagination.

The moment Dan stepped foot in the lounge, Phil let out a loud and pointed cough. Dan sighed and stood in front of the TV, directly blocking Phil’s line of vision.

“Get out of the way, rat!”

“Can I sit with you then, idiot?”

Phil grumbled and looked up at Dan with an annoyed expression.

“You have something to say first…”

“I’m sorry. I’m a terrible husband for not telling you I would be late and making you eat Indian takeaway alone like a sad bachelor. Can I see my Philly now?”

Phil smirked and placed his hands on Dan’s hips, pulling him towards the couch. Dan flopped across the cushions, finishing up his pizza and laying his head in Phil’s lap. No sooner had he gotten comfortable than Phil started poking him in the ribs.

“Have you fulfilled  _ all  _ of your promises, Danny?”

“I did the dishes, calm down. Let me watch the drag queens in peace.”

Both men finally settled snugly into each other and into the couch. Eventually, Dewey came running in and jumped onto the couch, snuggling into Dan’s side. Phil brought his legs up and curled around Dan from behind while Dan started giving the dog a belly rub. Phil wrapped his arms around Dan’s middle and peppered the top of his head with little kisses. The three of them remained in comfortable silence for the rest of the show. Finally, as the episode wrapped up, Phil spoke again.

“I did miss you today, it wasn’t really a joke. I got a little worried something happened to you.”

“I’m sorry I worried you but I’m fine, Phil. Like I said, just got a little turned around is all.”

Phil took a deep breath and noticeably paused before he began to speak.

“Dan, look at me.”

On command, Dan flipped onto his other side and turned his back to the TV. Dewey jumped at the sudden movement and landed on the floor, finding a comfortable spot on the carpet to lay instead. Dan looked into Phil’s eyes with a little smile, but dropped his happy expression as soon as he noticed Phil’s taught lips and furrowed brows.

“What really happened? I know the bakery section is right next to the entrance and you didn’t even need to go to check out. I also know if I can figure that out and not get lost, you certainly wouldn’t either. So, can you please tell me the truth this time?”

Dan let out a sigh and attempted to prepare for a conversation he knew would be inevitable after the events of the day.

“Well, people recognized me, I got paranoid, and I hid in a random aisle. But then I found myself across from a big display of baby food and well… I got emotional.”

Phil pressed a kiss into Dan’s curls and hugged him a little tighter. Dan took a deep breath to steady himself for what he was about to say.

“I think I want to have a baby with you, Phil.”

Of course this conversation had come up many times in the span of their relationship, but neither man was quite prepared to discuss it head-on. It was always a quiet assumption; they searched for a house with a few extra bedrooms than they currently needed, they shared glances when they walked past a parent with a stroller, they stashed a little more money away with every month as they updated their budget.

“Now? Do you want to have a baby right now?” Phil clarified.

“I want to. I want that so, so badly, Phil. But I’m scared too, I can’t keep the thought of a child in my head without panicking. I could barely keep myself together in Tesco today, and getting recognized didn’t help. How’s our kid going to feel when they can’t go out in public with us without being spotted? How are we going to explain to them that millions of people are invested in their life? Can we even tell our audience? What is that kid going to do when they grow up and find out one day about all the people around the world who know about them?”

“Dan, love, just breathe, okay?”

Phil’s breaths slowed and Dan tried his best to mimic him. He nuzzled further into Phil’s chest as Phil rubbed slow circles on Dan’s back.

“Don’t worry about all that stuff right now. Just tell me why you, Dan Howell, want a baby.”

“I don’t know, I think I’m just a mother hen. I see babies and little kids and I just want to take care of them. I want to have a little one to read stories to and tuck into bed and give so much love to. And I think we’d be great dads, you especially. You made me feel safe for the first time, Phil. Imagine how loved you’d make our child feel.”

Tears started forming in Dan’s eyes and soon they were rolling down his cheeks. He sniffled and looked up at Phil, who was on the verge of tears himself.

“I’d like that. I’d like that very much, Dan. You’re going to be such a good dad, our kid will adore you. Let’s talk about this more in the morning though, yeah?”

Dan nodded and Phil pulled him in a little closer. He placed a hand on Dan’s cheek and guided his lips into a kiss, warm and sweet and filled with hope for a life even warmer and sweeter.


	3. Chapter 3

_With a strong twist, Dan opened the jar of “Banana Brekkie”, his son’s favourite. He carefully scooped out a little bit of the brown mush onto a bright green plastic spoon and prepared for takeoff. He lifted the spoon higher and higher as fins emerged from each side and exhaust started shooting out from the bottom. Dan dropped the spoon in shock, unsure how a little baby spoon could possess this sort of technology. But the rocket-spoon propelled itself up then turned and pointed directly at its target. Dan’s eyes followed its trajectory and were met with the happy face of a little baby, a boy with wide brown eyes and an even wider smile. Dan matched it with a bright grin but his expression soon turned to concern when the rocket-spoon started to accelerate. The head of the spoon was now a pointed nose cone, still holding the mushy food, speeding towards the baby’s mouth. Dan reached out to grab the rocket-spoon but it moved too fast for him to catch. It shot into the baby’s mouth with a blinding flash of white light…_

Dan sat up in bed, bewildered by what he just witnessed. Stress dreams were nothing new, both he and Phil had plenty back when Norman was around, then a new variety around the time they adopted Dewey. But baby dreams were something else. He could no longer simply leave his room to find that his fish or his dog were okay. His child was a hypothetical, one whose existence was still in limbo, one who was currently only an amalgamation of all the strange thoughts and feelings that bubbled up in the middle of an aisle of baby food. Somehow these feelings were strong enough to seep into his subconscious, strong enough to indicate that he needed to have another conversation with the other potential father. But rolling over, he only saw the thrown-back sheets and rumpled pillow next to him.

With a huff, Dan turned and planted his feet on the floor. He stood and walked away from the bed, picking up a t-shirt and some joggers to throw on over his boxers. On the way out, he collected a few of Phil’s stray socks and tossed them in the hamper. 

Heading towards the kitchen, he heard the typical commotion of any other morning, his husband busying himself with making breakfast and his dog running around under his feet. As he entered the room, Dewey scurried over and leaned against Dan’s legs in a not-so-subtle request for some petting. Dan leaned down and ran his hand through the corgi’s long, amber-colored fur.

“Hey, you.”

Dan looked up to see Phil standing next to him. His quiff was a mess, his glasses were smudged, and his pajama pants were as ugly as ever, but he still looked absolutely gorgeous in Dan’s eyes. He stood up straight and reached out to pull Phil in and give him a peck on the lips.

“G’morning, birthday boy. Please tell me you made coffee?” Dan asked.

“Of course, but you’re on your own in terms of food.”

Dan realised Phil was holding a bowl in his grip, one filled with suspiciously golden flakes.

“Is that my Crunchy Nut?! There was barely any left!”

“That’s why I finished it up! There’s Shreddies in the cupboard, calm down.”

Dan scoffed, gave Phil a playful shove and began to prepare his morning cereal. Once he made up a bowl, poured his coffee, and sat at the breakfast bar next to Phil, his husband spoke again.

“So… do you want to continue our conversation from last night?”

Dan froze at those words, his spoon suspended in his now quivering hand. He put it back down into the bowl and sighed.

“You really don’t forget anything, do you?” he muttered to himself. “Fine, yes, sure, let’s just— let’s just talk about it.”

“We don’t have to if you’re not ready, Dan.”

“No, no, we should. I’m afraid my subconscious mind will kill me if we don’t.”

“What do you mean?” Phil looked at Dan quizzically for a moment. “Wait… did you dream about, you know, having a—”

“Yes, Phil, I dreamed about having a baby. A baby who I tried to feed some weird Tesco mush to but instead accidentally exploded with a mini rocketship. Because of course we can’t seem to have any commitments without any horrifying anxiety dreams.”

“Oh, dear…”

Phil cast his eyes down and frowned at the tile floor. Dan’s frustrated expression melted into a blend of sympathy and confusion as he looked at Phil.

“I had a dream we had a baby too. I was holding it, singing it a lullaby I think, but then it started shrinking in my arms. Its little nose turned into a beak and it started growing feathers. Then, there was no human baby, just a little baby bluebird in my hand. It kept chirping at me then it hopped out of my hand and through the window…” Phil sniffled and wiped his eyes underneath his glasses. “...but I don’t think it knew how to fly.”

“Oh, Phil…” Dan’s face softened and he opened up his arms. Phil slid in between them and buried his face in Dan’s chest. Dan embraced him tightly and rocked him back and forth. Eventually, Phil raised his head and spoke again, his voice soft and timid.

“Do you think this is a sign?”

Dan tutted, dropped his arms, and wriggled out of the hug. He placed his hands on Phil’s shoulders and looked him directly in the eyes.

“I won’t lie, I’m scared, just as much as you are about this. But we had these dreams about Norman and he had a wonderful life. We had these dreams again when we got Dewey and he’s doing great.”

On cue, Dewey came trotting back from wherever he scurried off to. Dan stood from the bar stool and crouched to give him some more affection.

Phil smiled softly and leaned down to pet the dog. He looked up and smiled a little wider at the loving gaze Dan was directing towards the corgi.

“You make a fair point. And you have nothing to worry about, Dan. You’re already the best dog daddy ever, isn’t he? Isn’t he the bestest daddy ever, Dewey? Yeah? Yeah, he is? I think so!”

Phil giggled and nuzzled into the dog’s fur. Dewey’s tail began to wag vigorously. He spun around happily and gave both his dads a lick on the nose.

“Oh god, we’re going to embarrass the hell out of that kid. I honestly can’t wait. Just don’t say ‘dog daddy’ again.”

Phil let out another laugh, this one with his tongue trapped between his teeth.

Eventually, both men settled back onto the bar stools and Dewey scampered to another part of the house. They went quiet for a moment, both taking small sips from their coffees.

“So, we’re really doing this, huh?”

Dan turned with a bright smile on his face, only growing wider when he looked at Phil.

“Yeah... Yeah, I suppose we are.”


	4. Chapter 4

As excited as Dan was about discussing everything related to their hypothetical child, there was a party to be held that evening and much more to do than sit around and talk about future babies. Of course, Dan procrastinated much of the preparation and his husband was no help. Phil seemed to have more birthday get-togethers every year and this one was no exception. At the moment, he was out getting lunch with some uni friends then tomorrow he and Dan would be out of the house all day with the Lesters. But for now, Dan was alone with only Dewey to keep him company as he cleaned the place up for his in-laws.

Though he loved Phil’s family dearly, his need to impress them always made these sorts of chores more tiresome. Dan couldn’t control himself from picking up the rest of Phil’s stray socks and Dewey’s shedded fur, both of which could be found on just about every surface of the house. He mopped the floors, assembled a couple platters of appetizers and even hung up some streamers and balloons that were far too colourful for his own taste. Finally, he began preparing the guest room for Kath and Nigel’s stay.

Dan and Phil often forgot how large their house really was when they were busy going about their daily lives. They never ate in the dining room unless they had company, they only needed one of the three bathrooms, and two of the bedrooms were perpetually empty. It was far too much space for just the two of them, but of course someday it would be the perfect amount for their family. Dinners would be spent at the table, passing around home-cooked meals night after night and sharing stories from each day at school. Mornings would consist of wake-up calls to every sleepyhead still tucked away in their bedrooms, hectic meals around the breakfast bar, and packed lunches handed off at the door. Dan could imagine cleaning up after the frenzy once he sent each little one off. If any of them took after Phil, there would certainly be more socks to collect and crumbs to sweep up. There’d be sippy cups and cereal bowls to wash, toys and games to put away, and beds that Dan would try to get the kids to make but eventually would just make himself.

He smiled to himself as he laid a beige duvet over the spare bed in the guest room. Maybe he wouldn’t mind doing this every day. He’d feel proud about always being able to give his kids a clean home to return to. Maybe he could let them take for granted something he never had growing up. He and Phil would never have to work so much that their kids would come home to an empty house. Their kids would never have to make dinner for themselves before they could even reach all of the cabinets or tuck themselves into bed at night when they were still afraid of the dark. Every night, they could fall asleep after a story and a kiss on the forehead with no doubt of how loved they really were. Maybe Dan would pass down his stuffed bear to one of his kids and they’d fall asleep with it in their arms every night, just like Dan did as a little boy. Maybe he’d have a little boy just like him, with unruly curls and chocolate brown eyes, eyes that gazed at him like those of the little boy in Tesco…

Dan blinked and tried to return to the task at hand. It was one thing to fantasize about having kids but quite another to envision offspring of his own creation. The thought made him squirm but he couldn’t deny that it was something he wasn’t completely against. But these were thoughts he couldn’t have before talking to Phil. They were in this together, through and through, and Dan couldn’t go fantasizing about a little half-Howell before any decisions had even been made. Though Dan knew it was selfish, he wished Phil was home. He wanted nothing more than to sit down and start figuring out how to have a baby together. He wanted to make lists of potential names, start researching adoption agencies and fertility clinics, and begin working towards making these intrusive fantasies come true. 

But it was his husband’s birthday and he’d be a horrible partner if he didn’t let him celebrate. So, Dan got back to work, fluffing pillows, folding towels, and collecting blankets to put on the guest bed. Just as he deemed the room clean enough for Kath and Nigel’s stay, Dan heard the front door open and excited paws start bouncing across the hardwood floor. He ran down the steps to find Dewey enthusiastically greeting Phil at the door, jumping up on his calves and giving him little licks on the nose.

“Hey there.”

Phil looked up and smiled at Dan. He stood up from his crouched position and approached his husband, wrapping his arms around his waist.

“Hi, Dan,” Phil whispered as he lowered his head and placed a kiss on Dan’s cheek. Dan ran a hand through the hair on the back of Phil’s head and kept it there as his husband continued kissing him, moving across his jawline and down his neck. Dan let out a soft moan then a laugh.

“I was going to ask how your afternoon was but I guess there’s not much to talk about.”

“Talk later. Just want you,” Phil mumbled against Dan’s skin.

“Your family is going to be here in like an hour, you know.”

Phil lifted his head and gave Dan an incredulous look, eyebrows slanted and pinched.

“You really think that highly of yourself, huh?”

“Shut up!” Dan yelled with a light slap to Phil’s thigh. 

“Hey, it’s a useful thing! We’ll have to get it done quick when we have babies crying and kiddos running around.”

Dan felt his stomach drop. He looked down nervously at his shoes as Phil giggled at what he just said. He stopped laughing as Dan looked back up at Phil, whose brows were now furrowed in concern.

“Babe, what’s wrong? Are you okay?” Dan gave Phil a weak smile and leaned into his arms. Phil wrapped him up into an embrace in response. “Sorry about that, I know talking about kid stuff is a lot right now.”

Dan sighed and nuzzled his face into Phil’s jumper.

“No, it’s alright. Just thinking about any future babies makes me all nervous and excited and confused all at the same time. Especially thinking about fucking you while we’re supposed to be taking care of them, you weirdo,” Dan said with a light chuckle at the end.

“I mean, we’re going to have to squeeze it in somehow!”

“Mate, you’re not squeezing anything in tonight if you keep this up.”

Phil started to snicker, then couldn’t control his laughter as Dan joined in. The two men were soon breaking down laughing, still holding each other in the middle of their foyer. Eventually, they settled down and Phil spoke again, slowly and cautiously.

“So… is the offer still on the table?”

Dan pulled out of the hug immediately and looked at Phil with an annoyed yet incredibly fond expression and a pointed finger.

“You’re lucky it’s your birthday, Lester.”

Phil leaned in and kissed Dan squarely on the mouth, then grabbed his hand and led him back up the stairs, past the empty rooms and away from all the space yet to be filled.


	5. Chapter 5

They had barely finished cleaning themselves up, hastily putting back on clothes they had tossed on the floor and wiping up any evidence of what they had just been up to, when Dan and Phil heard the doorbell ring. The two men made their way down the stairs and were quick to open the front door to let everyone in. Dewey soon came running over to help welcome the guests. Martyn and Cornelia came in first, giving their coats to Phil, before giving the corgi at their feet lots of affection. Phil’s parents filed in soon after and Kath immediately began fussing about, handing off a large tupperware container to Dan and taking off her coat. She tried to hang it on the coat rack near the door but it was a bit too high up for her small frame.

“Mum, let me take that. Just settle in, Dan and I have everything taken care of,” Phil said to his mother as he hung up the other coats with ease.

“Oh, alright, child. It’s so nice to see you boys again! I brought some cakes for the occasion!”

“We already have cake, it’s a birthday party for god sake…” Phil muttered under his breath.

“These look great, thanks Kath!” Dan, never one to disappoint the Lesters, chimed in with a wide smile plastered across his face.

“Thank you, sweetheart,” Kath said with a kind smile as she reached up to pinch Dan’s cheek. He grinned and pulled her into a gentle hug.

Phil sighed and rolled his eyes.

“Oh, don’t get jealous just because your husband has much better manners than you, Philip,” Kath quipped and reached out to hug him too.

Dan giggled to himself and was met by a frown from Phil.

“Why don’t I show you two to your room for the night?” Dan said. Kath broke away from the embrace, quick to follow Nigel and Dan upstairs.

“You boys have done so much with the house! I don’t think we’ve been back since we helped you move in, is that right dear?” Nigel asked, turning to Kath as they ascended the stairs.

“That’s right, I love how you’ve decorated everything! I do wonder what you’ll do with all these extra rooms though,” Kath replied, following Dan down the hallway.

Dan felt chills run down his legs and suddenly the two suitcases he was carrying seemed so much heavier. He was quick to guide the guests to their temporary room and set their luggage down.

“Well, I’ve got the bed made up for you and there’s towels and blankets over here. I’ll let you two settle in. When you’re ready, we’ll have snacks and wine in the kitchen.” Dan spoke quickly and curtly, purposefully ignoring Kath’s comment. He didn’t spend another moment in the room, turning around and heading back down the stairs with hurried steps, pushing out all the thoughts of putting the house’s excess space to use that were currently intruding his consciousness.

…

After an hour of chatting in the kitchen around the plates of appetizers and another hour spent at the dining room table, passing around a makeshift lasagna and drinking enough wine to keep the conversation flowing, Dan’s introverted nature was getting the best of him. He loved having company, especially Phil’s family, who had really become Dan’s as well. But his brain, already worn out from cleaning and sex, kept taunting him with ruminations about children, the ones who’d fill up all the empty space Kath had taken note of. Afraid of totally spiraling in front of his in-laws, Dan suddenly stood from the table, once he noticed that everyone had finished their meals and the conversation died down a bit, and clapped his hands together.

“Alright, who wants cake?”

Soon enough, dirty dishes were getting passed back to the kitchen and Dan was ducking into the fridge to retrieve the box he had stowed away the day before. Trying his best not to think about jars and baby food and little boys in grocery stores, he pulled out the cake, took it out of the box, poked a couple candles into it, and lit each one. A smile crept up on his face at the thought of everyone seeing the message written in frosting across the top.

When everyone else was seated, Dan started marching towards the dining room as Cornelia led everyone in a somewhat off-key rendition of “Happy Birthday”. Dan stood behind Phil and reached around him to set down the cake.

“Oh my GOD, Dan!” Phil squealed and put a hand to his mouth. He started laughing uncontrollably and everyone else ran to his side to take a peek at what he was reacting to.

“Pass? No, ph- ph- phass? What’s- What is a- What is a ‘phass’?” Kath asked, looking incredibly puzzled.

“It’s a long story that I really don’t want to go into… it’s just a pun really,” Dan said sheepishly, shaking his head. Phil’s face was a bright shade of pink and he was wiping tears from his eyes.

“I think this might be the best one yet, babe,” Phil said once he could begin to speak again.

“It’s the least I could do, old man,” Dan replied with a giggle. Phil responded with a sour expression and a swat to the hand Dan had placed on his arm.

“Jesus, get a room, you two,” Martyn muttered, rolling his eyes at his brother and brother-in-law.

Eventually, everyone had finally calmed down from the ridiculous pun and Dan cut the cake, passing out slices down the table. He made sure to give Phil the slice that said “ass”.

…

Eventually, the party was over. Phil had opened all of his presents, including an RPG-inspired board game from Dan that Phil insisted his family had to play with him at some point soon, Martyn and Cornelia had left to head back to their flat, and Kath and Nigel had settled in for the night in the guest room. Once all the dishes were washed, the wrapping paper was thrown away, and the rest of the remnants of the evening were cleaned up, Dan and Phil finally headed upstairs and to their bed. Phil fell asleep quickly, like he always did after a few glasses of wine, but Dan was still wide awake well into the night. His mind was filled with racing thoughts that were impossible to slow down. Snippets of a life he didn’t yet have appeared to him as if they were actual memories. At first, they were happy. He saw a little toddler cautiously walking towards him with a bright smile on his face, a young girl practicing piano and trying to hit all the right notes, a baby lovingly grasping a stuffed bear. But soon, the images started to become panic inducing. The toddler fell flat on his face and let out a piercing wail. The young girl started violently pounding the piano keys, creating discordant, ear-splitting sounds. The baby threw the stuffed bear across the room and let out a shriek that sounded like it was coming from a hundred different babies.

Dan covered his ears and started to cry. His body shook back and forth, as if it was trying to physically catapult every haunting image away. Eventually, as the visions began to fade, his body slowed itself down. He rolled over to find Phil still sleeping peacefully. Dan, though certainly feeling envious, didn’t have the heart to wake his husband so he stumbled out of bed and headed down the stairs. Just as he entered the kitchen, he caught sight of a small figure in a white nightgown and jumped in fright.

“Oh, hello dear! Fancy seeing you at this hour. A fellow insomniac, I see.” Kath turned around to face Dan with a kind smile.

“H- h- hi. Hi there. Just coming down to make a cup of tea real quick, that chamomile sure is magical! Sorry to bother you, I’ll be goingー”

“Dan, it’s alright. I didn’t mean to frighten you, darling. Are you alright?”

Dan went silent and fresh tears began to crop up in the corners of his eyes. He looked down at Kath and shook his head. Without words, he bent over and wrapped her up in a hug. Somehow, for someone so much smaller than him, it felt like she was the one enveloping him, imbuing him with a similar feeling of comfort that her son could give him on these anxious nights. After a long pause, Dan finally unwrapped himself from Kath’s embrace and spoke with a soft and timid voice.

“Actually, I need your advice about something.”

Kath looked up at him with an expression of sympathy and nodded.

“Let me make us some tea, first. That chamomile really is magic at calming your nerves.”

Dan took a seat at the breakfast bar, watching his mother-in-law put the kettle on and set out two mugs. She poured the water and added a small spoonful of honey to each mug, then handed one to Dan and settled into the seat next to him with the other steaming in her hands.

“So, what seems to be the matter?”

He gave her a small smile and sipped at his tea. It was the perfect blend of earthy and sweet, warming his insides and calming his anxious mind just as Kath predicted.

“Well recently, and don’t freak out when I say this, Phil and I have decided we want to have a baby, soon. We’re not sure how or when exactly, but we both are hoping to be dads sometime in the near future.”

“Oh my! That’s wonderful! How exciting it must be to start thinking about bringing a child into your life… but those thoughts can be pretty scary too, I remember them well.”

“Yeah, yeah, they’re… pretty bloody terrifying. I just keep having these weird visions, like all the time now. I keep seeing our life with children, but only little bits and pieces. Like, during the day, they’re always so beautiful, too perfect to be real but at night, they’re so… well, so horrible, it’s hard to describe. It’s like my brain is taunting me, showing me all this happiness I could have and all this terror I’m going to get because Phil and I are going to mess up in one way or another raising these kidsー”

“Darling, just breathe. Listen to me, these thoughts of yours, they’re completely normal. Both times I found out I was pregnant, I couldn’t sleep for weeks. I was so scared I’d fail as a parent that I’d get nightmares constantly. But, you know what? I realized that these nightmares weren’t reality, they were just my brain trying to make sense of my fears. And once I got over those fears, all my bad dreams were gone. I just had to remember that Nigel and I were capable of being good parents and that having all these anxieties would only make it harder to raise kids in a happy, healthy home.”

Kath reached out to pat Dan’s arm with one hand and brush off his tears with the other.

“And you know what I think? I think you and Phil are going to blow Nigel and I out of the water when it comes to parenting. I don’t know any two people as loving, passionate, and resilient as the pair of you. You’re going to take care of your children, however many you have and however they may come about, so well, it will be absolutely astounding. So, all I need you to do is drink your tea before it gets cold and tell all those scary thoughts to piss off!”

Dan laughed and wiped a few more tears from his face. He grinned at Kath and pulled her into another hug.

“What did I ever do to deserve you, Kathryn?”

She quietly chuckled and patted Dan on the back.

“You’re a good man, Daniel. You’re a good man and you’ll be an even better father. Just you wait, my dear…”


	6. Chapter 6

It was surprisingly warm outside for the first day of February. Dan only needed to wear his grey denim jacket, or really the one he tended to steal from Phil’s wardrobe, for this family excursion. Kath had decided that the boys had been cooped up inside their house for far too long and needed to enjoy some time in nature. Though they were anything but outdoorsy types, perhaps she had a point, Dan thought. After all of his strange spirals, nightmares, and ruminations, he could use some time to simply breathe in a little fresh air and get some sunshine on his skin. He was walking next to Nigel in a comfortable silence, admiring the view in front of him. The natural landscape was all well and good but the way Phil moved in his new pair of chinos had Dan mesmerized. He smirked at his dorky husband ambling along, head in the clouds, fascinated by all the birds in the sky.

“Do you think we’ll see any bluebirds today?” Phil asked his mum. Kath turned to her son and chuckled.

“You boys really don’t go out in nature very much, do you?” She shook her head with a kind smile. “There aren’t any bluebirds in England, they’re American creatures. Beautiful though, truly. It’s a shame we don’t have the privilege of seeing ‘em.”

The group went silent again for a few moments, still walking along the trail and gazing at the wildlife around them.

“Well, do they have any meaning to them? Like are they symbols or omens or whatever?”

“Oh, yes, indeed! Your grandmother knew everything about birds, she saw a special meaning in every variety. The bluebird was one of her favourites; any time anyone she knew traveled to America, she’d ask them if they saw any. According to her, they are a symbol of joy, a sign that something good is about to come into your life.”

Kath turned to Dan and gave him a little wink, so quick he barely believed he even saw it. He hadn’t told Phil about their conversation the night before or the fact that she knew what was causing Dan so much emotional turmoil.

Then, he realized why Phil was asking such a strange question. His dream, the one he had only a few nights prior, showed him a baby bluebird, then promptly let it fly, whether it knew how to or not. Dan shuddered at the thought. Some symbol of hope, alright…

…

The sun had set by the time the four of them returned from their walk. After a quick dinner of leftovers from the party, Kath and Nigel headed up to the guest room for the night, leaving Dan and Phil in the kitchen to clean up and do the dishes. As Dan was scrubbing off grease from one of their platters, he remembered Phil’s question from earlier in the day.

“So, that’s weird, right? The bluebird thing?”

Phil scrunched his eyebrows and looked up from the counter he was wiping, giving Dan a small smile.

“Yeah, I guess it was. I never knew my grandma loved birds so much.”

“No, but like, the symbolism, right? Wasn’t that weird and kind of perfect and a little eery though?”

Phil looked back at the counter and his hand, the one wiping down the granite surface with a sponge, suddenly stopped. He blinked a few times before answering.

“Are you saying that my brain told me we’d be having a baby soon because of some weird bird symbolism my grandma probably made up?”

“Hey, she was psychic, wasn’t she? That probably means something.”

Phil looked back up at Dan with a face now looking more concerned than content.

“But the bird couldn’t fly, Dan. It literally sunk, what the hell kind of meaning is that supposed to have? This symbol of coming good fortune just falling to the ground? Is that comforting to you? Because I’m a little freaked out to be honest.”

Dan shook the suds off his wet hands, quickly dried them off on a towel, and approached Phil, placing one hand on his husband’s back.

“Hey, hey, it’s alright, it’s just a dream, yeah? I had a dream a spoon turned into a rocket, that’s not exactly a prediction of the future to say the least. This is a big deal, our subconscious minds are probably just freaking out a little. Maybe we should start doing a little planning to calm them down. I actually wanted to talk to you about this all day yesterday but because you're the special birthday boy who gets all the treats I held off.”

Phil chuckled softly, put the sponge on the counter, and wrapped Dan in a hug.

“Yeah, that sounds good. It’s still early anyway, despite whatever my parents consider ‘staying up late’. Let’s just finish cleaning up and we’ll have a chat, yeah?”

Dan nodded, his chin resting on Phil’s shoulder. He squeezed his husband a little tighter, preparing for the conversation ahead.

… 

“What I want to know is why babies are so goddamn expensive…” Dan muttered into his laptop as he and Phil started reading articles from a couple family planning sites.

“We don’t have to technically ‘have a baby’, you know. We could adopt a kid who’s a little older, like a toddler or even a school-age child. Not quite as expensive as a little newborn, I don’t think.”

Dan shivered a little in his seat and swallowed hard.

“I- I- I guess, yeah. I just- I dunno, I always pictured us with a little baby, you know? Changing diapers, bottle feeding, all that. Like having a little being we could shape and influence and teach from the very beginning.”

“Sure, I’d like that too, of course I would. It’s just that newborns are the ones that get adopted and if we wanted to adopt one, we’d have to be on a waiting list for years and, well…”

“We’re not exactly getting any younger.”

Phil nodded and crossed his arms. Dan could just barely see his hands begin to shake. He frowned, knowing how hard of a subject this was to broach with Phil. Another birthday meant another year closer to 40 and another reminder of his mortality. Of course, Dan knew Phil didn’t believe he’d live forever. He knew Phil noticed every grey hair pop up, every wrinkle deepen, every ache that was never there before.

Dan gave his husband a little smile and reached out to squeeze his hand.

“But we _are_ still young, remember. Young enough to be parents for sure and young enough to wait a couple years for that to happen if we have to.”

“Or we could always…”

“...make a baby.” Dan frowned at the words. It was so strange to think about becoming parents that way. When there are so many kids living in foster care who need a loving home, creating life in a lab, a life that only biologically belongs to one of them, and growing it inside a stranger seemed so wrong to him. But he couldn’t deny that he felt drawn to the option too.

“We would be able to have a baby pretty quickly, as long as we’re able to get pregnant without too much hassle,” Dan murmured.

“You make it sound so easy, Dan,” Phil giggled, “like you could have just knocked me up last night and that’s that.”

Dan rolled his eyes at Phil’s comment and chuckled darkly.

“God, I wish. You know, straight couples don’t have to go through any of this bullshit, right? Some dude can just shoot a load into his wife and there you go. If they adopt, they’re either infertile or it’s like some great noble deed like Brangelina or some shit. Meanwhile, if we don’t adopt, we look like assholes just because we may want to have a newborn baby too, and maybe we do want to pass on our genes, even if there are some crap ones in the mix—”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, it’s alright, Dan, settle down.”

Phil squeezed Dan’s hand tightly and waited to speak until Dan could look him in the eyes.

“Do you want to get a surrogate? Because it’s okay if you do, as long as it’s what you want. We have the privilege to afford it without much financial difficulty so it’s certainly an option. But _is_ that something you want to do?”

“I… I don’t— I don’t know, Phil. I think the process itself would be the best option for us, I’m just scared of the consequences. If we do this, we’re gonna have a tiny, helpless baby to take care of, a baby that at this point we have no idea how to raise. And there’s the whole genetics thing, too. Either we’d raise a child that you’re the biological father of and they’re super smart and weird as hell or I’ll be the biological father and… god, that kid could have some issues.”

“Dan, it’ll be alright. First of all, I’m sure you’re going to research the hell out of this and make sure we read every parenting book in existence so we’ll be _too_ prepared by the time we have an actual baby. And second of all, because you’ll make sure we’re such well-prepared parents, we’ll know how to raise happy, healthy children, and we’ll love them no matter whose DNA they have. I know you have concerns about what you could pass down but by deciding to become parents, we have to be ready to face any challenges that come up. It would be the same whether we had an adopted kid, one made with my sperm or one made with yours. What matters most is that, if we do choose this route, we can create a viable little embryo that’ll make it to the finish line. And from there, we’ll shower that baby with love, no matter who is actually related to it.”

Dan looked up at his husband, who only now saw the tears streaming down Dan’s rosy cheeks. Phil grinned and Dan smiled back just as brightly. They both quietly chuckled and soon were embracing each other tightly.

“Let’s make a baby then, yeah?” Phil whispered into Dan’s ear.

Dan nodded and nuzzled his face into Phil’s chest, feeling so grateful for the man he was at the cusp of starting a family with.


	7. Chapter 7

Dan stumbled out of bed that morning with a headache and a mind cluttered with recollections of the previous evening’s discussion. He thought he woke up from a dream, maybe something about the world burning and children crying. Probably something along those lines, he assumed.

He walked across the room and glanced out the window. It was barely even light outside. The sky was still a blend of pink, yellow, and purple, the sun still low on the horizon. There wasn’t a sign of human activity, only the birds that had just begun to stir, some practicing their morning calls. Dan breathed deeply, taking in the scenery on the other side of the glass. It was peaceful out there, not silent but just the right level of quiet, truly the opposite of everything that was going on in Dan’s brain at the moment.

He looked back at the bed, empty aside from one of Phil’s discarded socks laying across the rumpled sheets. Dan figured that Phil was probably puttering around somewhere in the house, occupying himself until his morning coffee kicked in. He figured Phil wouldn’t notice if Dan had a little time to himself outside this morning. He couldn’t say the same for his in-laws down the hall but he knew they could fend for themselves when they woke up.

So, Dan pulled on some joggers and a t-shirt, then slid into a pair of trainers, laced them up and started heading for the bedroom door. Just before he left the room, Dan figured it would be best to take his phone, just in case Kath or Nigel needed anything and so Phil wouldn’t think this was one of  _ those _ kinds of walks, one where neither Dan nor Phil knew when he would return. 

… 

Dan wasn’t sure why he enjoyed running. He never used to think of himself as someone who exercised often, and certainly not as someone with any kind of athletic ability. But in recent years, really ever since he trained for the marathon he never ran, he realized there was nothing quite as satisfying as putting his brain on standby for a while and letting his body do its thing. After yet another night of off-putting dreams about his future, a future that was, as dictated by a bird, supposedly brimming with good fortune, he needed a break from the strange visions intruding his mind.

But Dan, skeptical as he claimed to be, realized the universe had other plans. About five blocks from his home, he spotted a public park in his peripheral vision. He turned his head and saw dozens of children, far more than he’d expected to be out this early in the morning. Noticing the school nearby, Dan assumed they were probably playing before their classes started, but nevertheless he was thrown off by their presence. They all had parents with them too, mostly mothers. Many of the women had smaller babies with them too, little ones bundled up in strollers or Baby Bjorns. Some of the mums were pregnant too, those ones seemed to stick together, Dan noticed. He bet they were probably swapping advice or telling gruesome stories about all the gory details of their pregnancies thus far. His eyes wandered away from them, catching sight of a little girl running across the field. The little brown ringlets in her hair were bouncing as her feet moved faster and faster. But all of a sudden, she was on the ground, probably as a result of tripping over the rocks or tree roots in her path. As soon as she hit the ground, a man from across the park ran toward her. Dan marveled at how similar they looked: bouncy brown hair, a bit curlier than Dan’s own, big green eyes, olive skin, even similar curves to their noses.

“Daddy!” she yelled.

Dan felt his heart skip a beat. He saw the man pick up his daughter and hold her close to his chest, wrapping her up in a hug. His nose was buried in her hair and his eyes were closed, that is until he looked up and saw Dan standing there. They made eye contact and Dan looked away, his body snapping back into running mode immediately. He shuddered at how creepy that must have looked, some tall grown man standing alone just staring at a park full of children. He glanced behind him, just to be sure no one was out to get him.

…

He was about a mile and a half from home when he got the call. His phone had been vibrating in the pocket of his joggers for at least 30 seconds but he didn’t notice until he began slowing down as he approached a crosswalk. He took it out and immediately answered upon noticing it was Kath calling.

“Daniel?” her voice trembled a little as she spoke.

“Yeah, is there something wrong? I’ve just been on a run in the neighborhood.”

“Well, y- y- yes, you see… Phil is having one of his… oh, I don’t know what they’re called these days. Something’s up with his anxiety, that’s all I can tell. I found him in the lounge this morning sitting in a ball on the floor just shaking. He had all these papers around him and, by the looks of him, it seems he was up all night on the computer. I need you to come home right now to see what’s going on. He just keeps asking for you, that’s all I can get out of him.”

Dan almost considered hanging up the phone that instant and sprinting straight home. He could barely even speak, let alone process any of the details of what Kath said or respond appropriately. Before he too started shaking uncontrollably, he took a breath and addressed his mother-in-law.

“I’ll be home in less than 15 minutes. Just stay strong, mum, yeah?”

“I’ll try my best. See you soon, dear.”

“Bye.”

… 

Dan had hoped what he’d see when he entered his home would be an improvement from what Kath described. It had been long enough, he thought. When Phil had the rare panic attack, it was certainly scary but it never lasted longer than ten minutes. But when he entered the house, he shuttered at what he heard.

“Dan??? DAN?!?” Phil cried from across the house. His voice was anything but stable and he sounded like he was probably in the midst of a sob.

Dan raced up the stairs, following Phil’s voice, and arrived at the lounge, just where Kath said she found him. He was still curled up like she described but he looked more like he just finished panicking than in the midst of an attack. Kath was sitting next to him, arms wrapped around her son’s shaking body. His head had drooped onto her shoulder and he was cuddled into her chest, looking more like a little boy than a man on the verge of middle age.

Phil locked eyes with Dan the second he entered the room. Releasing himself from his mother’s grip, he tried to stand but fell the second he lifted himself up. Kath gently took his arm, anchoring him to the floor. Dan ran up, sat in front of his husband, and opened his arms. Phil immediately fell into them, rubbing his face on Dan’s shirt in an attempt to wipe away his tears.

“Dan…” he sobbed into his chest, “I need you.”

“I’m right here, baby. I’ve got you. We both do,” he looked at Kath and gave her a nod. “Can you tell me what happened, bub?”

“Eggs… money… embryos… sperm… contracts… lawyers… doctors…” he murmured, each word coming out slower and softer than the last. Phil nestled further into Dan’s hold, still rubbing his head back and forth into his husband’s chest.

Dan looked around in that moment, remembering what Kath said about the papers. Indeed, all around them were dozens of sheets of paper, all print-outs from websites of different clinics, law firms, and blogs.

“Oh, Philly… were you up all night doing research?”

Phil nodded slowly, his head gently knocking into Dan’s chin.

“Ok, it’s alright, darling. There’s nothing to be worried about.” Dan started stroking Phil’s back, moving one hand up and down slowly.

“B- b- b- but- but, the baby? Wh- wh- what about the baby?”

“We don’t have a baby right now, honey. We’re working on it, remember?”

“N- n- no, no, the baby bluebird, it came back in my dream… I was holding it, it was small enough to fit right here,” Phil pointed to the palm of his right hand, “It was so cute, Dan. B- b- but then a big mean crow burst through the window, then another one came, and another, and another…”

Phil started sobbing again, his voice reaching higher and higher pitches as he spoke. Fresh tears started pouring anew from his eyes and he fell back into Dan.

“Shhh, shhh, it’s ok, it’s just a dream. No big scary birds are coming for our baby, yeah? There is no baby yet, but we’ll keep that baby safe when this is their home, I promise.”

“B- b- b- bu- but.. But, there’s so much to do… And why are we even doing this, Dan? What’s even the fucking point, huh?”

Dan shuddered at the way Phil swore, with more vitriol in his voice than he had ever heard his sweet husband use before. He realized that tears were starting to fall from his eyes too.

“Philip.” Kath said sternly. Dan jumped a little, remembering that she had been sitting beside her son the whole time.

Phil turned around slowly to face his mother. She quietly tutted and gave him a wry smile.

“You’re getting yourself all worked up, child. This is what you do when you want something so bad, you’re scared you won’t be able to have it. You’ve always done this, remember? The night before you proposed you called me rambling on about how Dan is going to say no, and you see how that worked out, huh?” She glanced at Dan and gave him a wink. “I remember even as a little boy, you fretted about your first day of primary school, just like this. You cried and cried, so scared about what would happen. But you came back home the next day so happy, so excited to tell me everything about your day.”

Phil sniffled and leaned into Kath’s open arms. She wrapped them tightly around her son and planted a little kiss on the top of his head.

“And you know what, child? This will be just the same. I know you’re scared and exhausted and overwhelmed but, like every time before, this will pass and it will all work out, yeah? You and Dan are going to have a baby, a precious little one that is all your own. And your baby is a bluebird after all, the ultimate creature of goodness and hope.”

Phil gave her a warm smile and pulled away from the embrace. He finally stood up and looked down at his mother and his husband, still with a smile on his face.

“So, you think we’re ready to bring an incredibly expensive little bluebird into the world?”

Dan nodded, stood up and pulled Phil in for a kiss. When he pulled away, he looked back at his husband with a grin.

“We’re ready, I’ve never been more sure of anything else but that.”


	8. Chapter 8

“God, don’t you just wish you could lay an egg sometimes?”

Dan snorted and shot Phil an incredulous look.

“Babe, what are you on about?”

“You know, it would be so much easier if one of us could just lay an egg but instead we gotta use somebody else’s.”

Dan fully turned his body this time, looking Phil directly in the eyes.

“These women didn’t lay their eggs themselves, you buffoon! They had to get, like, I dunno, surgery or something to get them out! What, you think we’re looking at whatever they shot out into a nest?!”

Phil couldn’t hold back his laughter and soon his tongue was poking through his teeth. Dan couldn’t help but grin fondly in response.

“I don’t know! You know neither of us know anything about women! How was I supposed to know—”

Phil couldn’t even finish his sentence before Dan started hitting him with a pillow he took from the couch they were sitting on. Phil’s giggles were now muffled by the fabric as he pushed back at Dan’s attack.

“Well, you’re gonna have to know soon! Please don’t embarrass me at our next appointment going on about egg hatching or whatever the fuck is in your brain.”

Dan finally threw the pillow to the floor and pulled his still-giggling husband into his arms.

“Ooh! I like her,” Phil said when he caught sight of Dan’s laptop in front of him.

“What, this one? With the red hair?”

“Yeah! Look, she has blue eyes like we wanted, the ginger hair is nice and it’s a bit curly too, see?”

Dan released his grip on Phil and instead picked up his laptop to look at the picture more closely.

For the past six months, ever since Kath and Nigel headed off after the birthday party, Dan and Phil had devoted most of their free time to figuring out how to make a baby. They found an attorney specializing in non-traditional family planning, a fertility clinic where all the eventual treatments would be done, and a surrogacy agency to be matched with a surrogate. 

The agency had also provided them with an egg donor database, a web page filled with pictures of nameless women, where every piece of information that they could ever want about each one was readily available. The two men both found it overwhelming at first. They had spent hours deliberating over every trait that was listed, looking at all the possible filters and categories they could search for. Phil argued for someone who enjoyed horror movies so the kid wouldn’t get nightmares if they saw one while Dan joked that the only donor he’d consider is one whose favourite colour is black.

Eventually, all of the peripheral details were too much to actually consider. They knew that all that really mattered was that their donor of choice have a good character, decent intelligence, and the physical traits that were on their list. It certainly felt strange to figure out what the ideal biological mother of their future child would look like, but they knew deep down it did matter to them. Though only one of them could be the biological father, Dan and Phil were both comforted by the fact that some aspects of both of their appearances could be passed down. Dan insisted that they find someone with pale blue eyes of a shade comparable to Phil’s own, while Phil asserted that the donor must have at least some curl to their hair to match Dan’s texture. 

Dan tried his best not to think about the uncomfortable nature of the process, something that felt more like playing God than simulating anything natural at all. Instead, he tried to think of why they were even going through this strange undertaking in the first place. As he leaned into Phil’s side and added this newest donor to their list of favourites, he pictured having a baby with all the features of him and his husband they could possibly give to one little being. He could imagine holding his child and running a hand through their soft ginger ringlets, looking into the baby’s eyes and smiling at the deep shade of brown, or perhaps a bright blue hue, looking back at him. With enough cooing and rocking, he’d get the baby to smile and have a chance to see those precious little dimples. Maybe he could even make his child giggle too… 

“We’re not going down the wrong path, are we?”

Phil’s question brought Dan out of his thoughts. He looked over to see his husband frowning with a crease forming between his brows. Though he hadn’t had a panic attack since his episode six months ago, Dan had to keep a careful eye on Phil’s anxiety every day. He noticed his husband asking for reassurance more often, needing more hugs and cuddles, and frequently waking up in the night. At one point, Dan suggested Phil start going to therapy but he insisted he was fine. “I haven’t fainted yet, have I?” he’d say, effectively ending every conversation about the matter. So, Dan became his husband’s pseudo-therapist, keeping a close eye on his mood and forcing him to step away from work or baby research whenever it became too much for Phil to handle.

“Phil, we’ve talked about this, we’re going with the option that works best for us and what we want our family to be,” Dan replied, patting Phil gently on the back.

Phil slowly nodded, nuzzling his face into Dan’s chest. Dan put his laptop aside and lay back on the couch, holding Phil in his arms. Soon, Dewey ran into the room and leaped onto the couch, contentedly settling into Dan’s side.

“But let’s not worry about that now, yeah? Our family is pretty good just the way it is for the time being,” Dan said softly, petting the happy corgi with one hand and stroking Phil’s cheek with the other.

It wasn’t long before Dan heard quiet snores coming from the lanky man sprawled over him. He chuckled under his breath and leaned forward to kiss the top of his husband’s head.

“I can’t wait to make a little addition to our family with you, though, hopefully pretty soon if all goes well, not to jinx anything of course, I know you’d call me out for that if you were conscious right now.”

Phil continued to snore, a small trail of drool now leaving his mouth. His quiff was barely intact, most of the reddish brown hair sticking up at odd angles and tangling together. Dan knew of no man more beautiful.

“We’re going to have a little baby someday, isn’t that insane? You’re going to be a dad!  _ I’m _ going to be a dad… God, that’s terrifying. Let’s just hope we don’t mess that kid up too much, huh?”

Dan gently poked Phil’s cheek and grinned.

“But that’s alright because I wouldn’t want to be a dad with anyone else, Phil. I can promise you that.”

Maybe he was imagining it but Dan swore he could see a soft smile creep up on his husband’s face. Dan chuckled and held Phil a little tighter, dreaming about the days when his promise could come true.


	9. Chapter 9

“It’s so great to meet you. We’re both so excited to talk about potentially going through all this with you.”

“Oh, believe me, I’m over the moon! I mean, having the chance to carry a baby for Dan and Phil of all people?! I’ve practically won the lottery!”

Dan turned to his husband with a look of horror and winced when he was met with a light kick to the shin.

“Heather, what are your motivations for becoming a surrogate?” Phil said calmly, though Dan could see the tension in the corners of his eyes.

“Well, I needed money and I’d be willing to have a baby to get it so I applied, passed all the tests and somehow got set up with ‘dan is not on fire’ and ‘Amazing Phil’ of all people!”

“Actually, I think we’ve gotten enough information from this conversation and your personal profile for today. We’ll be in touch if… well, no.” Dan blurted out, quickly standing from the table and pushing his chair in.

“My husband means to say it’s been a pleasure to meet you, Heather, and we’ll contact you shortly if needed.”

With that, Phil grabbed Dan’s hand and pulled him along, briskly walking out of the cafe.

“But—” Heather stuttered.

“Thank you for your time!” Phil called as he marched through the exit, husband in hand.

…

“God, why can’t we just get a surrogate like normal people?! I can’t believe the three people we’ve talked to so far all just wanted to get knocked up so they can say they’re carrying some ‘celebrity baby’!”

Dan fell back onto the couch and grabbed the pillow next to him, covering his face and screaming into the blue corduroy.

“Babe, it’s okay. Neither of us are like Ed Sheeran or whatever, we’ll find someone who doesn’t know who we are,” Phil said, putting his arm around his husband.

“Ugh, I don’t want to think about any Ed Sheeran offspring right now,” Dan stuck his tongue out, making Phil giggle.

“I’m just saying, we haven’t been putting out consistent content on YouTube for a few years now. And it’s not like screenwriters or activists have super famous faces.”

“I know, we’re not _that_ famous. I just wish we didn’t have to deal with like, _actual_ _people_. Like, with the donor, we could just pick out a profile picture because who gives a fuck if she knows who we are, we’ll probably never have to talk to her in person.”

“Well, our kid could meet her when they’re 18 if they wanted to, like if they get curious about their biological mum.”

Dan shuddered at the thought. 

“I just don’t like the idea that some woman currently out there in the world could have a child she doesn’t even know exists, and that that kid would even question having two dads and want to seek out the woman whose egg got fertilized by ‘the real dad’ like one of us doesn’t even matter…”

“Hey, hey, I didn’t mean to upset you. I’m just saying it’s something we could consider, but we have time to think about it, yeah? For now, let’s just worry about who we’re going to put that egg into.” Phil moved his arm down and began to rub Dan’s back.

“This whole process is so fuckin’ weird…” he muttered. Phil chuckled in response and leaned his head on Dan’s shoulder.

“Yeah, well, that suits us pretty well then. Now, let’s find the right womb for the job.”

…

Phil’s leg wouldn’t stop bouncing underneath the table of the diner. Dan placed a gentle hand on his husband’s trembling knee to try and calm it but Phil’s movements didn’t slow.

“Fuck!” Dan exclaimed, a bit too loudly for the busy restaurant setting.

“Dan, shh! Don’t make a scene!”

“You’re the one who kneed my hand into the table!”

“Well, you decided to put your hand on my knee!”

“I put my hand on my knee because you can’t seem to calm yourself down!”

“I am calm!”

“Are you… Daniel and Philip?”

Dan and Phil slowly turned their heads to look at the woman in front of them. She glanced at her phone and back at them, seemingly checking to make sure they were who she was supposed to meet. Her bright green eyes widened and she moved a loose strand of wavy blonde hair behind her ear.

“Oh, I’m sorry if I interrupted anything… We did agree to meet at noon, yeah? I hope I’m not too early, I always tend to be late and I didn’t want to mess this up…”

Phil quickly rose from the table and offered his hand to her.

“No, no, I’m sorry, my husband and I were just a little nervous.”

“I thought you said you were calm…” Dan murmured under his breath.

Phil rolled his eyes at him and continued.

“You must be Molly? Here take a seat,” He shook her hand then pulled out a chair for her and sat back down next to a slouching Dan, giving him a quick elbow to the ribs as a reminder to behave.

“Yes, hello! It’s so nice to meet the two of you.”

“It’s nice to meet you too, Molly,” Dan said quietly. “How about we order some lunch? Food’s on us.”

…

“So, what do you two do for a living?”

Dan almost choked on his grilled cheese at the question. Simultaneously, Phil sputtered his tomato soup and Dan handed him a napkin to clean it up. Dan coughed and took a long sip of his soda, before he could even attempt to answer.

“Well… I mostly do activist work for mental health and LGBT charities and non-profit organizations. Sometimes they let me do some stand-up comedy at their benefit dinners—”

“‘Comedy’,” Phil said with a chuckle, using his entire hands as air quotes. Dan rolled his eyes with a smirk.

“Oh, that’s so nice! What a fulfilling career that must be. What about you, Phil?”

Phil bit his tongue in an attempt to contain his laughter but ended up giggling with his tongue trapped between his teeth.

“Um,” he let out a quick laugh before continuing, “I actually wrote a graphic novel that’s currently being turned into a Netflix series, so I’m the head screenwriter on that project.”

“Wow! That’s incredible! You both seem so creative!” Molly gave them a lopsided grin. Dan chuckled at her remark and smiled at Phil who beamed back at him.

“So, what are your motivations to becoming a surrogate, Molly?” Phil asked, turning back to her.

“Well, my husband is a marketing agent, so he travels all the time to various conferences and such. We have two kids, a son who’s 3 and a daughter who’s a year and a half, so I have to stay home with them all day, every day since they’re not old enough to go to school yet. I love my kids, I really do, but I needed some other purpose in my life. I went to nursing school but I had to drop out before I got my degree because I accidentally got pregnant with my son. Ever since then, I’ve just been cleaning the house, cooking dinner, and changing nappies every day, and I’ve felt like I’ve been missing out on something. So, I heard about this job and it just felt right. Like, I loved being pregnant, honestly, but I don’t want any more kids of my own. And what’s a better purpose than helping two people who can’t have a baby on their own become parents?”

Dan wiped a tear from his eye and stood up from the table, opening his arms to the woman in front of him.

“Oh, hey, it’s okay. Come here, Dan,” she tutted, wrapping him into a hug. Phil soon joined in and embraced both of them.

“So, I’m assuming this is a yes?” she said quietly, still embracing the two men, both of whom were tearing up at this point.

“Yes, please, if you’ll be willing to deal with us, that is,” Dan laughed softly.

“Of course I’ll deal with you. You’ve helped me find my purpose, after all.”

All three of them were crying at this point, holding each other close in the middle of the diner, at the beginning of a purpose soon to be fulfilled.


	10. Chapter 10

_Dan felt a strange rumble in his stomach; Strange, in the sense that whatever was causing the sensation was certainly not a part of himself. He placed a hand on his abdomen and lurched backwards into the wall behind him. The vibrations emanating from where he placed his hand were alien enough but the fact that what he felt could best be described as a… bump, well that was bloody terrifying._

_He dreaded looking down at his body but Dan knew it was his only choice. His eyes slowly moved downwards until they caught sight of where the rumbling must have been coming from._

_“AAHHHH! PHIL! PHIL, HELP, WHAT THE FUCK HAPPENED TO ME?!?” He screamed at the top of his lungs, hoping his husband was somewhere nearby._

_“Dan?! Dan, what’s wrong, baby?”_

_“B- b- baby? Baby! That’s what’s fuckin’ wrong with me! Do you see this? When did I get abducted and how did the aliens manage to probe me so effectively?”_

_“What are you on about? We’re expecting, remember?”_

_“Expecting?!? Expecting a goddamn xenomorph, I’m assuming?!”_

_“Hey, hey, calm down, your hormones are all out of whack right now, it’s okay. Let’s just relax and not disturb the baby_ —”

 _All of a sudden, Dan’s bump began to swell, expanding like a balloon being filled with air. But it didn’t seem to stop, and it was beginning to feel like the balloon could burst at any second. Phil’s eyes were transfixed on the bump, his skin as white as a sheet. He reached out a finger to touch the growing mass but as soon as he made contact_ —

_POP!_

…

“So, you’re telling me you had a dream that you were… pregnant?”

Dan nodded seriously but couldn’t help the smirk forming on his face as he watched Phil try holding back his giggles.

“Hey, it’s not funny, bub. I think I gave birth at the end there and it couldn’t have been a pretty sight.”

Phil was fully laughing at this point, though he was trying to contain it with a hand over his mouth.

“And I—” Phil couldn’t get through his sentence without giggling, “I thought it was normal?”

“Yeah, you were going on about my hormones or whatever, it was kinda cute, actually.”

“Aww, that is sort of cute, in a weird mpreg kinda way,” Phil remarked, gently resting a hand on Dan’s mostly-flat stomach.

“There’s no baby in there, you know,” Dan said with a chuckle. But as he looked up and met Phil’s big, kind eyes, he smiled sincerely.

“Oh, Philly…” Dan tutted, wrapping an arm around his husband’s waist. Phil tucked his head underneath Dan’s jaw, his hand still pressed against Dan’s stomach.

“You could pull off pregnancy. It would be a good look on you, I think.”

“Yeah? You think I’d look good with a little baby bump?” Dan pursed his lips and rubbed his stomach, making Phil laugh again.

“Oh yeah, like maternity fashion model good-looking,” Phil looked at Dan with a grin. He reached his free hand up and threaded his fingers through a few loose curls, still a little frizzy from sleep.

Dan sat up on the bed and leaned into Phil’s touch.

“Mmmm, you think I could get away with doing one of those cheesy photoshoots, where I’m like smiling at the bump as my flowy white skirt blows in the wind?”

“Definitely, we could do one like Titanic pose too, with me behind you, maybe even hold one of those corny chalkboards saying something like ‘Your first breath will take ours away…’”

Shifting to face him, Dan looked at Phil with soft eyes and jutted his bottom lip out in a pouty expression.

“Aww, Philly, that’s actually really sweet. You haven’t been googling maternity photoshoots, have you?”

“Maybe… but only because you’d look really cute holding a little chalkboard with some stupid message like that on it.”

“Well, _you’d_ look really cute Titanic posing with my bump but I don’t think that’s happening any time soon, unless scientists announce they’ve come up with some kind of womb implant tomorrow,” Dan snickered, though he couldn’t deny that he was trying to hold back the tears forming in his eyes too.

“We could still have a photoshoot, you know,” Phil murmured, rubbing circles on Dan’s stomach.

“What, once we get Molly pregnant? I guess, but isn’t that kind of thing for women who are actually keeping their babies?”

“No, like for us, like a dad photoshoot. We could still pose and hold those silly little chalkboards and maybe a sonogram picture once that’s a thing. It could be like a cute baby announcement, like for family and friends…”

“And the fans?” Dan raised his eyebrows.

“What d’you mean?” Phil asked quizzically, giving Dan’s stomach a light poke.

“Well, they have to know at some point, right? We can’t exactly hide having a baby, not with the people who follow us at least. They figured out we were engaged like a week after you proposed, I’m still not quite sure how that happened…”

“Who says we can’t hide it? We were able to convince them we were ‘best mates’ for like a decade.”

“Okay, ‘convince’ is a strong word, there. And don’t you think that having a baby is going to be pretty obvious? Like we’re going to have to go outside with the kid at some point and we can’t really pretend we’re pushing around someone else’s pram if a fan runs into us. It’ll be pretty impossible to take any pictures or videos around the house without showing any monitors or toys or tiny socks, since I know with you those will end up everywhere. And what if you do a liveshow and the baby starts crying? And besides that, they’re going to wonder why we stop working or posting anything for a few months.”

“Hey, I’ll keep the little baby socks neat!” Phil chuckled and swatted Dan on the arm. “And we don’t have to stop working _completely_ when the baby comes, right? I mean, all it’s going to be doing for the first few months is just sleeping, eating, and pooping, I think I can work around that.”

“ _Phil._ ” Dan gave his husband a stark glare and quirked one of his brows. “Don’t make me wake you up every two hours and see how well you work after that.”

“Alright, alright. But… ,” Phil sighed, “Do we really have to tell them? Aren’t we all better off if it’s all just kept private?”

“ _It_ will be a living being, Phil, not a shared bedroom or an unacknowledged anniversary vacation. We don’t have to post any pictures of the kid but we’ll never in a million years get away with pretending we don’t have any kids at all.”

Phil grumbled and buried his face in Dan’s chest in response.

“What do you think, alien fetus?” Phil asked, looking down at Dan’s stomach.

“I think my dads are total weirdos!” Dan spoke in a falsetto voice, pinching the fat on his abdomen to look like a mouth.

Phil giggled and nestled his body further into Dan’s side.

“But I know they want the best for me, too… So, maybe I’ll just be an adorable little open secret that cries so much, my dads won’t be able to sleep for months!”

Dan’s impression faltered toward the end as he descended into laughter. He pulled Phil close to him and kissed the top of his head.

“Ok, one chalkboard picture of me and your other dad, but that’s it! I want you all to ourselves, my little alien!”

Phil began peppering Dan’s stomach with kisses, making him laugh even harder at the ticklish sensation.

“Don’t tell Molly anything about my dream, yeah? I don’t want to freak her out more than we probably already did.” Dan said as his laughter settled down.

“Yeah, that’s probably for the best. Your pregnancy can be our little alien secret.”

Dan smiled and lie back on the bed, humming contentedly as Phil rested his head on his stomach, as if something really was stirring inside of there.


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> soooooo... baby bluebird is back! I apologize for such a long hiatus. the whole corona thing really turned my life upside down and it's taken a while to get back on my feet. I'll try my best to keep uploading chapters regularly! thank you all for your patience <3
> 
> also, this chapter was inspired by the baby name discussion happening on @watergator's tumblr. emmy, as usual, made me emo about parent!phan ;_;

“You’re absolutely sure you don’t like Philippa?”

“Phil, I’d tell you I’m crossing it off the list but I didn’t even bother to add it.”

“Hey! It’s a perfectly nice name! What about Phyllis? Or Philbert, if it’s a boy?”

Dan rolled his eyes with a smirk and gently pushed Phil’s foot back. They were lying on either end of the sofa, legs tangled together, each with a laptop on their chests. On the coffee table in front of them lay a mess of papers: crumbled up notes on the backs of receipts, printed out family trees with annotations scribbled here and there, a couple books dog-eared throughout, even a small dictionary just for inspiration’s sake, as Phil suggested. Dewey lay under the table, quietly snuffling in his sleep, his belly in the air. 

“You know, my parents were never able to use the name Yazi, it’s still up for grabs.”

Phil chuckled until he looked up from the laptop to be met with Dan’s serious expression and abruptly stopped laughing.

“You’ve got to be kidding me, Dan.”

“Hey, it would be some kind of contribution from my family… And don’t we want our kid to have a unique name?”

Both men began laughing again, a little forced and awkward, more for the purpose of trying to change the subject than anything else.

Coming up with the middle name had been easy. If they had a boy, it would be Nigel, named after Phil’s father, the obvious choice given Dan hadn’t been in contact with his own father for many years. Similarly, if they had a girl, it would be Kathryn. Though there was nothing Dan’s mother did to deserve the omission, both men knew Kath had to be their possible daughter’s namesake. She was not only a mother to Phil, but to Dan too in many ways, and besides, both men refused to make their daughter into an actual Karen.

But the first name was much trickier business. Not only had Dan lost his chance to include any Howell family names, an issue he was trying to move past the best he could, he was also struggling to find a name that suited both his and Phil’s particularities. They wanted something unique, yet familiar, something with a nice ring to it, but also with a meaningful origin. Even without their specifications, it was hard enough to find a name that would sound right with the mouthful of a last name the kid would be born with, Howell-Lester.

“What about Jack? Jack Howell-Lester? Pretty snazzy, eh?” Phil piped up, trying to lighten the mood.

“Pretty basic! Come on, Phil. You’re literally a writer, the entire internet will relentlessly make fun of you if you name our kid ‘Jack’ or ‘Grace’ or—”

“Susan! Dan, please, what about Susan?”

Phil burst into a fit of giggles at the sight of his husband’s stony glare. Dan sat up and slowly leaned towards Phil, his hands reaching to grab his neck.

“Hey! I was kidding! I was kidding!”

Now Dan couldn’t stop giggling either as he gently held onto Phil’s neck. He kissed Phil’s cheek before leaning back against the arm of the sofa.

“Okay, let’s be serious, Philly. We’ve only got…”

Dan lifted his arm to look at his wrist as if he was checking a watch.

“...two months until the implantation,  _ hopefully _ nine months of pregnancy—” 

“Dan.”

“Sorry, no jinxing,” Dan looked up at Phil with a hopeful smile, “and really the kid can go a couple of weeks of its life without a name, right?”

“Hey, I told you we could’ve been doing more important medical paperwork but that can wait. This is more fun and knowing you, picking out a name is  _ at least _ a ten month process.”

“Oy!” Dan kicked his foot at Phil.

But truthfully, Dan needed to pick out a name before they went much further through the process. He needed their future child to start to have an identity, so at least he could start to imagine their life with the new baby, or even be hopeful that they’d be able to have a baby at all.

His laughter subsided and he quickly reached over to grab a paper from the table, clearing his throat and wiping at his eyes. He knew Phil had a lot more optimism than he did and Dan was trying his best not to crush it with his own anxieties.

“Well, anyways,” Dan cleared his throat again, “can we go over the list one more time? We have like twenty names on here, some of them have got to go.”

He passed the paper to Phil who pushed his glasses up and began to read.

“Winston, Winifred, Winona, Edwina…”

“Ok, I really like Winnie the Pooh, I get it… Just get rid of all of those, as long as you promise we can put the baby in a Tigger outfit for their first Halloween.”

“Aw, I was hoping we could get them a baby Yoda costume but I guess that can get pushed off a year,” Phil said jokingly, crossing off all the Winnie variations from the list.

“Ok,” he continued. “George, Charlotte, Louie…”

“Cute names, but no, our kid is not going to be associated with the monarchy.”

“Fine, fine. We’ll put Yazi on the list but Charlotte is too offensive, got it,” Phil mumbled to himself as he crossed more names off.

Dan rolled his eyes and leaned back, staring at the ceiling.

“Olivia, Oliver, Alexandra, Alexander…”

Phil continued to rattle off the list as Dan’s mind drifted. He was imagining seeing their child’s name for the first time on their birth certificate. He pictured Christmas cards they’d send out year after year from Dan, Phil, Dewey, and… untitled Howell-Lester project #1, birthday parties with their child’s name written out in frosting on the cake, yearbooks with their kid listed under all the, likely very nerdy, activities they’d get involved in at school, college acceptance letters and job applications in the far future…

“Just stop with the goddamn list, Phil.”

Phil looked up at Dan with a furrowed brow, setting the list down on his lap. He fell silent, reaching out for his husband’s hand and squeezing it.

“I don’t know if I’m ready to do this right now.”

Dan looked up at Phil, his eyes now filling with tears. He sniffled and continued speaking before Phil could pipe up.

“I can’t— Our baby, it—  _ they _ … aren’t here yet. They’re not even a fucking embryo. They’re not a boy or a girl or a fucking clump of cells, they’re just…  _ nothing _ .”

“Dan…” Phil squeezed his husband’s hand tighter but let him continue.

“What if they hate their name? What if they’re trans or non-binary and their birth name is  _ harmful _ to them? What if there’s not going to be any—”

“ _ Dan! _ ” Phil interjected, not letting Dan crumble any longer. “There is going to be a baby, okay? One way or another, yeah? Remember what Dr. Friedman told us? We’ve got a 45% chance after three cycles.  _ Forty-five _ . That’s good, unusually good, remember?”

Dan nodded slowly eyes still glued to the ceiling. He sniffled and roughly wiped at his nose.

“If it helps…” Phil continued, speaking more softly now as he sat up and pulled Dan up from the arm of the sofa and into his arms, “we can stick to just the gender-neutral names, love.”

He slowly rubbed circles into Dan’s back with one hand and supported his husband’s head against his shoulder with the other.

“I think…” Dan sniffled. “I think that would be good. I just want them to be happy no matter who they realize they really are. I want them to know we care…”

“And we do care, Dan,” Phil said, pulling back to look Dan in the eyes. “We’re going to be good parents, and we’ll make sure our kid knows we support them, yeah? And I agree we should give them whatever name reflects that.”

Dan smiled softly and tucked his head back into the crook of Phil’s neck. The discussion of names could wait until later in the evening. For now, Dan just needed to be held and reminded of all the love he and his husband were preparing to give to whatever their future baby would become, whatever they may be called.


	12. Chapter 12

“So… have we come to a decision?”

Dan looked at Phil, then at Dr. Friedman, then back at Phil.

“Well, yes…,” Dan began hesitantly, leaning forward in the cold metal seat in front of the doctor’s desk, eyes transfixed on the framed picture of Dr. Friedman and his wife holding their two year-old son.

“...and no.”

Dan looked up to see the doctor giving him a quizzical smile, running a hand through his brown, greying beard.

“We both want to contribute a sample,” Phil spoke up, leaning forward and placing a reassuring hand on Dan’s.

“I can only let you implant one embryo—”

“And we understand that, doctor,” Dan responded, his remark coming out a little louder and more pointed than he expected.

“But,” he continued, “we both want to make embryos, just so there’s a chance either of us could be the father.”

“ _ Biological _ father,” Phil chimed in with a forced smile, lightly bumping his leg against his husband’s.

The doctor tapped his pen on his desk a few times, eye contact shifting back and forth between Phil and Dan.

“We can do that, it’s certainly not uncommon for our male same-sex couples…”

“ _ But? _ ” Dan interjected. Phil responded with another, more forceful hit to the knee.

“But,” Dr. Friedman continued, cocking an eyebrow at Dan, “it is clinic policy that we must inform you who fathered the embryo that will be implanted.”

“So… no surprise?” Phil asked, his hand gripping Dan’s tighter.

“No surprise. I apologize gentlemen, but in the event that you split up during the pregnancy, the biological father is the one to have legal rights over the embryo. If you didn’t know whose it was, it would make the whole debacle unnecessarily complicated. I know it may not be what you hoped for but believe me, it’s for the best.”

Dan felt his heart drop into his stomach. His tongue could have been in knots for all he could tell as even if he wanted to speak, no words would be able to come out.

Instead, he expressed the indescribable frustration brewing inside him by roughly releasing his hand from Phil’s grip, standing up, and pushing the metal chair back with an ear-piercing scrape.

“ _ Dan! _ ” Phil bellowed sternly.

But Dan was already walking through the office door and out into the hallway.

It didn’t take long to hear Phil’s footsteps behind him, one after another hitting the tile floor in a hurried jog.

“Dan…”

Dan stopped and turned to see his husband, halfway collapsed, his hands on his knees, head hanging down, panting heavily.

“I’m not going back in there.”

With that, Dan turned and took a few more steps down the hallway but stopped after a moment when he heard no footsteps trailing after him.

He whipped his head back in Phil’s direction, both men’s gazes locked on one another. They stood in silence in the empty hallway for a few beats until Phil quietly spoke up.

“That’s okay if you don’t want to… But I think it’s worth our time to go back and talk to him.”

“What, so we can be reminded that we’re never going to be able to pretend that this baby will belong to both of us?!”

The second those words came out of Dan’s mouth, he wished he could shove them back in and pretend they were never said. But they registered to Phil, loud and clear.

“You want to be a single father then? Be my guest.”

Phil turned his back to Dan and headed back to the office without another word.

“Phil! Phil, wait!”

Dan received no verbal reply, just a middle finger in response. He huffed and stormed off, stomping down the other end of the hall towards the parking lot.

With a forceful shove, he pushed the door to exit the clinic open and walked to his car, crawling into the driver’s seat and slamming the vehicle’s door shut.

For a moment, he contemplated leaving without Phil. He could easily pull out of the parking lot and head home alone to cry over some takeaway and a couple of drinks with only Dewey to keep him company, the member of the household who couldn’t start an argument with him. He sat in his car, leaning back in his seat and looking up through the sunroof for what felt like an eternity until he finally summoned the energy to open his phone.

_ im leaving. take a cab home if you feel like coming back. _

He typed the message out, his thumb hovering over the send button. Slowly, he lowered it, inching closer and closer to the screen.

_ Tap, tap, tap! _

Before Dan’s thumb could make impact, his head shot up at the sudden noise. He whipped around to face the passenger side and saw Phil standing in the parking lot, his knuckles rapping on the car window. Dan rolled his eyes and lowered the window his husband was facing.

“Don’t worry, I didn’t make any embryos without you.”

“Oh, thank God, I was riddled with zygotic FOMO over here,” Dan cracked a small smile and unlocked the passenger door.

Phil opened it and plopped into the seat with a huff. He turned to Dan with a sympathetic smirk and placed a hand over his husband’s.

“I’m sorry, love.”

Dan squeezed Phil’s hand in response and leaned in to plant a chaste kiss on his husband’s cheek.

“Don’t be,” he murmured as he pulled away. “I was being the arsehole, not you.”

After a beat of silence, Dan turned the keys in the ignition and started to head out of the clinic’s lot.

It wasn’t until they returned to the main road that Phil spoke up.

“You didn’t mean it, right? The thing about the baby not belonging to both of us?”

Dan swallowed, feeling his hands perspire on the steering wheel.

“No. No, I was just scared, is all. Still scared.”

“You think you’d be any less of a father if it’s not your sperm?”

“Not exactly… more scared of it being my sperm, honestly.”

Dan glanced at Phil, who was staring back at him with a creased brow and a slight frown.

“You could have told me that earlier, you know. Would’ve saved you the trouble of having to jizz in a cup.”

Dan snorted a laugh.

“I suppose…” he mumbled, returning to his serious tone. “I dunno, it’s stupid, really. Part of me hates the idea of passing on all my shit to an innocent kid who didn’t do anything to deserve that but part of me…”

“...wants to have that kid too?”

Dan sniffled and bit his tongue, trying his best not to cry whilst he was on the road. He didn’t feel the need to respond. Phil knew him well enough to understand when the answer went unsaid.

“Look, I talked to Friedman after you left. He said we could both make embryos and he’d just pick the healthiest one, the one that has the best chance of making it. Nothing to do with our genetics, really. It would just be up to fate.”

“But…” Phil continued hesitantly. “We can always find another clinic if need be. I’m sure there’s other places that’ll let us have our surprise instead.”

Dan grumbled and shook his head.

“No, no, Friedman’s already looked at our sperm, I don’t need any other doctors getting all up in there.” He and Phil both let out a few strained giggles. “But, I get it. Fate’s been pretty good to us, so far. I guess the best we can do is just let it work its magic.”

“Speaking of working some magic…” Phil commented as they pulled up to their home.

“Oh, shut up! I’m not going straight from talking about embryos to blowing you, you spoon!”

Both men began laughing, genuinely laughing, for the first time in what felt like days. As they unbuckled their seat belts, Dan reached over and pulled Phil into his arms. 

“Come here, you,” he murmured, helping Phil awkwardly climb over to the driver’s seat and into Dan’s lap.

He wrapped his arms around Phil’s waist and leaned his head into his husband’s chest, taking a moment to listen to his heartbeat.

“I couldn’t do this without you, you know. No matter how much I want a baby, single fatherhood is not for me.”

Phil smiled warmly down at Dan and kissed him softly on the forehead.

“Me neither, bub. Now, can we go inside so we don’t accidentally stain the dashboard?”

“Yeah, good plan.” Dan chuckled and opened the door, letting Phil climb off his lap and following him inside, into the home he was lucky enough to share with his companion.


	13. Chapter 13

_ The baby was crying. Well, there really never was a time when he was  _ not _ crying. Dan had been up what felt like, or what likely was, the whole night, just holding his screaming son, rocking back and forth in the chair beside his crib. _

_ There was no sign of him stopping anytime soon. His eyes were squinted and welling with tears and his face was as red as a tomato. He squirmed and fussed in Dan’s arms, kicking his feet up and down. _

_ “Why can’t you stop crying already?” Dan grumbled. _

_ “You did this to me, Daddy!” _

_ Dan gasped, his eyes scanning the room for the source of the voice. It wasn’t until he stood up that he realized there was no longer a baby in his arms, but instead a small child stood in front of him. _

_ Except… the boy had Dan’s face down to every detail: his large brown eyes and long eyelashes, beauty marks and dimples in the exact same places; he was a photo of five year-old Dan come to life. _

_ “You did this to me!” the boy repeated, pointing a finger up at Dan and stomping angrily. _

_ “What did I do?!” Dan screamed, dropping to the floor on his knees. _

_ Instead of responding with words, the boy just shrieked, so shrill Dan had to cover his ears and even then the noise was impossible to drown out… _

…

Dan woke up in a cold sweat. He knew it must have all been a dream,  _ it had to be _ , but he still had to get up to check that none of the spare rooms had been converted into nurseries just yet. He grabbed his phone and padded down the hall, hoping to make himself feel a bit better. But standing in one of the empty bedrooms at some ungodly hour didn’t make anything feel any more real. 

He paced the room, reminding himself that even though it was still empty, this would become a nursery soon enough. In the not so distant future, he and Phil would be waking up in the middle of the night to the sound of their baby crying. They’d rush into the nursery, night after night, taking care of whatever their child needed, their child who would look back at Dan with eyes too familiar to bear, who would cry and cry and probably never truly stop crying, dutifully taking after their father who, even in his mid-thirties, was crawled up in a ball, sobbing into his pajama pants.

He realised his phone was still clutched in his hand and thought maybe in this moment, it was his lifeline.

He pressed the contact’s number but never expected an actual response.

“Dan? Are you alright?”

He sniffled, immediately feeling comforted by the woman’s soft and gentle voice.

“Hey, Molly.”

…

“I do read your emails, you know. I’m fully aware of whose sperm is going inside me.” Molly chuckled warmly, causing Dan to involuntarily smile.

“I know, I know. It’s just… I don’t know what to do and I thought maybe you had some advice.”

“You’re not having doubts, are you? About having a baby?”

“No! No, no, no, I’ve got just as much baby fever as ever.” Dan forced out a laugh. “I— I just… I’m scared…”

“Because it’s gonna be yours?”

“Well, it’s going to belong to both of us—”

“You know what I mean, Dan. It’s your sperm and that scares you.”

“Yeah… I just feel like I signed this kid up for some kind of messed up lifelong punishment. I mean, who chooses to give their kid depression?! I thought Phil and I could up our chances of conceiving if we both contributed but I didn’t think there’d be any chance my embryos would be any  _ better _ . But they’re not better ‘cause they’re gonna take after  _ me _ and all of my bullshi—”

“ _ Dan.” _

Dan didn’t realize he was hyperventilating until Molly cut him off. His hands were trembling and he had been unconsciously rocking back and forth.

“Dan, listen to me. Just breathe, love. Can you do a good inhale for me?  _ Inhale… _ ”

Dan tried to push all other thoughts out of his mind and focus on Molly’s directions, filling his lungs with air.

“Good, now exhale… Keep breathing slowly while I talk to you, okay?”

Dan mumbled an affirmation, exhaling as deeply as he could.

“You and Phil are bringing a new life into this world  _ together _ . You two are a team and this baby is both of yours. And like with any new life, the way they look and how they think and feel will be out of your control. What you two  _ can _ control is caring for your child, making them feel loved and giving them a safe and loving home.”

“But—”

“Keep breathing, love. I know you want to tell me that the odds will be against this child’s favour because of your own genetic contributions. But, dear, that’s true of any child.”

Molly paused a moment and Dan could hear her take a deep breath of her own.

“My daughter was born with dwarfism. Neither my husband nor I have it, but the one lucky sperm that made Bella happened to have the mutation. It was random, unplanned, and unpreventable. We didn’t know she would be different in any way until she entered this world. Though it was a surprise, I don’t love her any less. Her difference makes her special and I will do everything in my power as her mother to give her as good and happy a childhood as I can. Do you understand what I’m telling you, Dan?”

New tears were falling from Dan’s eyes, but these were ones of relief, of comfort and safety in Molly’s words.

“Dan?”

“Yeah, I think I know what you’re trying to say.”

“Good. It might help if you recounted this conversation to Phil, too, you know.”

“Yes, yes, I will, once the sleeping beauty is awake. Why are you up this late anyways?”

“I— I woke up from a dream, actually. I was pregnant, your baby I’m pretty sure since you were there, and Phil too. We were listening to the heartbeat for the first time and I can so clearly recall the smile you had on your face. You were positively glowing, love.”

Dan chuckled to himself and shook his head.  _ What were the fucking chances? _ he thought.

He thanked Molly for their impromptu chat and hung up to let her get some rest. He looked up from his phone, still sitting alone in that empty room… except this time, the idea of what it would become didn’t seem quite as far from reality.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> * as someone with dwarfism, I decided to include that little tidbit. always love to promote disabled rights whenever I can :)


	14. Chapter 14

“G’morning, love,” Dan mumbled to Phil as he ambled into the kitchen, giving his husband a quick peck on the lips.

“Good morning, babe,” Phil replied as they pulled away, “and good morning, baby,” he said with a giggle turning to the picture on the fridge.

“Phil, I thought you were the one who didn’t want to jinx anything!” Dan tsked with a smirk.

“I’m not! Can’t I say ‘good morning’ to our child, Dan?” Phil chuckled after Dan responded with a roll of his eyes. He leaned in to give his husband another kiss then both he and Dan looked back at the picture stuck to the fridge with a little stork magnet, one Phil may have picked up just for the occasion.

It was silly, they both knew it, but looking at that picture, as grainy and hard to decipher as it was, made everything feel more real.

At first glance, it looked like TV static, just a blob of grey on a black background. But, with a careful eye, the image became clear. In the centre, surrounded by the grainy grey blob, was a bright white dot, looking almost like it was emitting a glow.

Dan still found it hard to believe that his cells helped make that little bundle of tissue currently growing into a new life within their surrogate’s uterus.

It was too early to know if the pregnancy was even official. The embryo needed time to implant and show signs that it was going to make it through the long nine months ahead.

But, for what felt like the first time in this entire process, Dan felt hopeful. He and Phil had gradually began talking more and more in terms of certainty. They had started browsing for baby supplies online, discussing what they wanted to furnish the nursery with and what fancy gadgets were actually worth getting, though they both agreed not to buy anything until at least three months into the pregnancy. Phil had even started putting together a scrapbook to document the whole pregnancy process, putting the sonogram of the embryo on the first page with the caption “Baby’s first picture!” Dan teased him for it, but couldn’t help tearing up a little too.

He still had his fears, of course he did. They were waiting for a call from Dr. Friedman announcing the pregnancy test results any day now and, to be honest, Dan wasn’t sure if he was more worried about hearing they were ‘negative’ or ‘positive’. There was still so much to plan and so much to worry about, as there always had been through this whole process. He still had frequent nightmares, usually ending up in the soon-to-be nursery after waking up, sometimes giving Molly a call if she happened to be awake. But the idea of actually being a father was becoming less and less scary to him, especially as their new life began to take shape.

…

A few days after the embryo transfer, Dan and Phil had begun going through everything they had in storage, hauling cardboard boxes down from the attic and opening up old storage trunks that hadn’t been touched in years, picking out things to pass down to the new baby. Kath had even sent over half a dozen boxes of old toys and trinkets from when her sons were little, as if Dan and Phil needed any more stuff to sort through. It was all very exciting though and opening every new box brought back a wave of memories for the two men, as well as visions of new memories they’d soon be making.

“Oh my god, it’s my old harmonica I had when I was a toddler! Why did my mum even keep this? It’s probably covered in little Phil germs.”

Phil pulled out the silver harmonica and held it up to his face.

“Mate, you are  _ not _ playing that, and our child isn’t either. I want neither your weird baby germs nor a headache from whatever  _ ‘music’ _ ” Dan put air quotes around the word, “comes out of that.”

Phil snorted and put the harmonica aside, returning to the box to search for more old memorabilia.

Dan was sifting through his own box, one he put away when they moved to the new house. He couldn’t remember what was inside and the only label on it was “DAN’S STUFF” written in messy Sharpie.

He was just about to finish emptying the box that had so far been filled with old danisnotonfire props when he saw a stuffed animal laying at the bottom.

“Phil!”

Phil lifted his head out of the box he was currently working on and looked over at Dan with a puzzled expression.

“It’s my bear!” Dan exclaimed. He pulled the dusty old teddy out and set it on his lap.

“How did that end up in some random storage box?” Phil asked.

“I’m not sure, I guess it must have gotten swept up with the rest of my old stuff last time we moved.”

The couple shared a knowing look for a moment before Phil spoke up.

“Do you… Maybe we could…”

“...That would be nice,” Dan replied with a soft smile.

He gently placed the bear into their pile of stuff to put in the nursery, along with Phil’s old baby blanket his Aunt Roz had knitted for him when he was born and an assortment of tiny clothes both Dan and Phil’s mothers had saved once their sons had grown out of them.

They spent the following hour sorting through more stuff and adding bit by bit to the nursery pile. But, as Dan kept opening new boxes, his mind was still thinking about that bear.

He remembered being 19, packing up what he wanted to take to uni from his childhood bedroom, picking up the bear and staring at it for a moment. Dan recalled imagining, for a fleeting second, passing that bear down to his child. He remembered looking at the stuffed animal with a soft smile before hastily throwing it into a box with other trinkets he’d put in his dorm. Back then, Dan didn’t even know if he was gay, let alone if he would ever have the chance to become a father. He was certainly head over heels for Phil at that point but his sexuality was still a puzzle to him and the idea of having a kid with another man was, back then, controversial and altogether terrifying, not that it still wasn’t in some ways.

But now, Dan let himself imagine passing that silly old bear down to his kid. He pictured tucking them in at night, the stuffed animal clutched in their arms. He could envision tea parties where he and Phil and the bear and probably a whole host of other toys were all guests who pretended to sip tea and eat imaginary finger sandwiches. He thought about that bear being something his kid held onto, even into their adolescence, like Dan did.

He was comforted in the fact that he could imagine these things now. It felt safe, and more importantly, it felt  _ right _ . Having a baby wasn’t just a dream anymore; it was quickly becoming a reality, even if right now that reality only consisted of a single glowing dot. That was enough for Dan to finally have some hope.


	15. Chapter 15

“Hey kiddo! This is your dad… daddy?”

“ _ Daddy… _ ”

“Oh, shut up!”

Dan jokingly hit Phil with a pillow, making his husband giggle and blush.

“This video’s for our  _ child _ , Phil! Don’t make it weird!”

“Hey, you’re the one calling yourself ‘daddy’.”

“Because that’s what we agreed I’d be called, you spoon!”

Dan lifted up his nose and snorted. Phil simply rolled his eyes with a smirk and turned the camera off.

“Take two?”

“I gotta piss, gonna try to cleanse my mind of anything not child-friendly while I’m at it,” Dan responded, getting up from the couch and heading to the bathroom upstairs.

He had only managed to close the bathroom door when he heard Phil calling for him, sounding frantic.

“DAN!”

Dan’s heart suddenly felt like it was beating out of his chest. He quickly opened the bathroom door and ran back down the stairs.

“What?! Is something wrong? Is it Molly? Did something happen?!”

Phil placed a hand on Dan’s shoulder and gave him a peck on the cheek.

“Everything should be fine. I just checked my phone and got a voicemail from Friedman. I think it’s the test results…”

“Oh my God… Oh my  _ God _ . Oh my GOD!” Dan began pacing in circles, his need to use the bathroom quickly forgotten about. “Phil, this is happening. Fuckin’ hell, why don’t you open it already?!”

“Don’t you want to finish the video first?”

Dan stopped in his tracks, shooting Phil an incredulous look.

“Are you kidding me? Is that really more important right now?”

Phil approached Dan and wrapped his arms around his husband’s neck. The two men looked at each other for a few moments before Phil spoke.

“Think about it, love. Right now, we’ve got Schrodinger’s embryo on our hands. We’re pregnant and we’re not at the same time.”

“Were you planning on telling me you got knocked up?” Dan snickered.

Phil giggled and shook his head.

“You know what I mean. So, we can make the video to document the last moment of our entire life before this baby changes everything. And, worst case scenario, we can have a few more moments of blissful ignorance if we find out… well, you know.”

Dan sighed and looped his hands around Phil’s waist, pulling him in for a hug.

“Fine, fine. Just don’t say ‘daddy’ like that this time.”

…

“Hey kiddo! I’m Phil, your papa!”

“Hi baby! I’m Dan, or well, you can call me Dad. Or Daddy, that would make more sense for a baby, wouldn’t it?”

“Dan, they’re not a baby anymore. If they’re watching this, they’re like at least twelve.”

“Right, sure, Phil. But you’re a baby right now, kiddo.”

“I mean, you’re actually just a little, tiny, baby embryo as we speak.”

Phil holds up the scrapbook, open to the first page where the picture of the sonogram is.

“That’s you!” Dan says excitedly, pointing at the bright white dot in the picture.

“Eventually, this book will have actual baby pictures though, I promise,” Phil adds.

“Anyways…” Dan says as Phil sets the scrapbook down. “we wanted to make this for you to tell you how important you are to us. Your papa and I have been working so hard over the last… what has it been? A year already?”

“Something like that.”

“Oh god, we’re all dying.”

“Dan! Child-appropriate, remember?”

“Right, sorry,” Dan chuckles and returns to his original train of thought. “No matter, we’ve spent a long-ass—”

“ _ Dan! _ ”

“Sorry, god! We’ve spent a long… a long time thinking about you. I don’t think we’ve ever done this much planning for anything in our lives, and we went on two world tours.”

“Yeah, our wedding wasn’t nearly this planned out. But to be fair, you don’t really have to put your bodily fluids into someone else to get married.”

“Phil! Don’t be gross!”

“Hey, they should know where they came from! We’ve probably given them the ‘how babies are made’ talk, or at least the ‘how babies are made when you’re gay’ talk by now.”

“ANYWAYS.” Dan clears his throat dramatically. “We can’t wait for you to be a part of our family. We have a name picked out for you but for the sake of avoiding any kind of jinxing or whatever, right now, we’re just going to call you Bluebird.”

Dan pauses for a moment, staring at the camera blankly.

“And why are we calling them that, Dan?” Phil gently nudges Dan with his shoulder.

“Because… because, well… Sorry, kid, your dad’s an easy cryer. You better get used to that.”

“Oh, I’m sure they will. Around here, it’ll be first steps, Dan cries. First day of school, Dan cries. First dentist’s appointment—”

“Okay, okay, they get it, Phil.” Dan swats at Phil playfully and tries to collect himself. “You’re our Bluebird because… because when we were first thinking of having you, we kept seeing bluebirds. In our dreams, specifically. And I’m not a big believer in like, fate or souls, or whatever, but once we found out what bluebirds represented, we knew it was more than coincidence.”

Dan’s fully tearing up at this point, his face reddening and his voice becoming more and more unsteady. He reaches for the tissue box and blows his nose.

“Do you want me to say it?” Phil whispers in his ear.

“No, no, it’s alright, Phil.” Dan throws his tissue in the bin and takes a deep breath before continuing. “They are a symbol of joy, a sign that something good is about to come into your life. Or, well, our life. And that ‘something’ is… you.”

Dan looks away from the camera and notices Phil starting to tear up too. He rests his head on Phil’s shoulder and wipes a couple tears off on his husband’s t-shirt.

“Alright, let’s end the video before the house starts to flood,” Phil says with a slightly shaky laugh.

Dan smiles and sits back up, waving at the camera.

“We’ll see you soon, Bluebird.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can't believe we've reached the end of this story! Thank you to everyone whose supported me along the way, whether by reading, reblogging, leaving kudos or commenting, I genuinely appreciate it so much. Big shoutout to Abie (@panlesters) and Emmy (@watergator) for their never-ending support of this fic.
> 
> BUT this story is not over yet! Get ready for a companion fic, "orchid child", to drop in a few weeks, where we'll pick up where we left off and see how parenting goes for our two favorite lads. Stay tuned on here and via my tumblr for updates!
> 
> Much love to you all <3 <3 <3  
> -Claudia

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Comments, kudos, and reblogs are always appreciated.
> 
> Check me out on tumblr [@plinth-of-life](https://plinth-of-life.tumblr.com) <3


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